It's an unequal fight: They have resources, we have resilience; they are merchants of death, we carry with us dreams of oppressed
Gujarat’s Dalit leader Jignesh Mewani has made an “urgent appeal” for funds through Crowdnewsing (click HERE) to support his campaign against the BJP ahead of the Gujarat elections. Text of the appeal:
Dear friends and well-wishers, ever since the horrific videos of Una flogging surfaced, some of us got together to relentlessly work against the fascist communal and brahmanical Gujarat government led by RSS-BJP. The Una flogging brought to the fore the largely invisible yet deeply entrenched casteist character of BJP led ruling class of Gujarat.
In no time, a massive consolidation of the Dalit masses took place in Gujarat. Dalits are just 7% in Gujarat and the mainstream media hardly highlighted their plight and suffering before. However, after one and half year of our continuous struggle under the Rashtriya Dalit Adhikar Manch, the mainstream media is forced to write about atrocities and marginalisation of Dalits in Gujarat. RDAM’s continuous struggle has been able to ensure actual possession of land to the Dalits, that had remained only on paper for the past many years.
This has instilled confidence and courage among the Dalit population, especially the youth. There is immense passion among the Dalit youth now to fight back the saffron hoodlums and their dangerous, anti-democratic and violent politics.
We uphold Babasaheb Ambedkar’s vision and dream and for that we need to give these fascist goons the biggest jolt on their home turf in Gujarat. Does that mean we are supporting any political party? No we are not. Our sole focus of campaign and consolidation is against these communal, casteist, patriarchal and fascist forces of RSS. Nothing more, but not nothing less.
But then we are a non-funded organization. We are one and half year old Dalit rights group which has never received funds from any political party, corporates, NGOs or funding agencies. Our organisation namely Rashtriya Dalit Adhikar Manch works and survives with people's contributions, the motto being - 'Janta ki ladayee, janta ke paiso se'.
On the other hand the enemy camp in power has immense backing not just from Indian corporations but global capital as well. These fascists are destroying not just Gujarat but the entire country, our secular fabric and our constitutional values. We have decided to fight back against these murderous gang. We have decided to stand up and speak truth to power, look the fascists in the eye and fight them back.
We do not have the big industrialists or global capitalists backing us. But we have you. Your support and contribution matter to us. We are confident that we can fight this immensely unequal battle if people stand by us. If the progressive, democratic people who stand by the dreams of Bhagat Singh and Babasaheb Ambedkar, of Birsa Munda, Jyotiba Phule and Savitribai Phule; if the struggles of the oppressed majority of the country stand by us, then we are confident we can fight back. And any jolt in Gujarat can snowball into a larger defeat of these fascist forces countrywide.
Let us fight back, unitedly and resolutely.
During and just before the upcoming Gujarat elections our plans are the following:
In next 3 weeks, we want to have 12 public meetings (jan sabhas) in various parts of Gujarat, each costing around 50-60 thousand rupees for stage, mike and other set up along with its publicity material. For this we are launching a Vehicle March from 26th November to 6th December using 4 buses, traveling cost of each would cost 10 thousand rupees per day.
Then food and accommodation of about 200 people every day, which will cost 25 thousand per day which amounts to 2,50,000 for 11 days.
At the end of the March we are planning a huge gathering of more than 50 thousand people at Ahmedabad, this particular event will cost nothing less than 2 lakh.
The total cost will therefore come around 20 lakh. This is nothing compared to the crores of rupees that the political parties launder during elections. We are putting our entire expenses open so that people can support us.
In all these rallies we are going to take the BJP-RSS head on, expose each and every of their anti-democratic moves in the past twenty two years and lay bare their thoroughly anti-people policies.
No. This is an unequal fight. They have the resources, we have the resilience. They are the merchants of death and destruction, we carry with us the dreams and struggles of the oppressed people for justice and democracy. We are not going to give up, but fight back. Fight back with us!
Seeking your support and solidarity…
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